Beethoven was an amazing composer, but was often misunderstood and thought of as crazy. This was due to the fact that he had a bad infection in his ear. People often think that Beethoven was completely deaf. This is not true. Beethoven had an infection in his inner ear canal. the human ear has little hairs in their ear that vibrate when sound hits them. The louder sounds hit the hairs deeper in the ear canal and the quiet sounds hit the hairs on the outer part of the ear. When Beethoven heard regular sounds such as a person talking in a regular tone it hit the hairs in the part of the ear that had an infection.This caused Beethoven great pain and he often lashed out because of it and why his music is either really loud or really soft.